Tuesday readers' views

Midland Daily News

Published
7:00 pm EST, Monday, January 12, 2009

Change the limits

To the editor:

Recently, there has been some discussion on the downside of term limits. A lack of experience and turnover have been problems. Just about the time a politician learns the job, the term is up. On the upside, term limits bring in new and fresh ideas. Term limits were imposed by voters who wished to prevent political dynasties by entrenched incumbents. It has worked to remove some awful political "hacks." However, it has also removed some very excellent legislators. Maybe it's time to take a new look at term limits. Could there be a better way to prevent "eternal cronyism."

Part of what voters voted for was not implemented anyway. Our representatives in Washington were unaffected. I propose a new ballot initiative for the 2010 election. Instead of term limits, this new proposal would limit the amount of money an incumbent could spend on any election cycle to 50 percent of the candidate's one-year income. This same law would allow challengers to spend up to one-year's salary of the position they are seeking.

Further, this ballot initiative would allow no other entity to spend money on behalf of the candidate without a disclosure and disclaimer. Printed ads that are not paid for by the candidate would contain a disclaimer such as the following: "This ad is a biased ad for one candidate over another. The information contained herein may or may not be true." Radio and television ads would require a similar audio disclaimer before the ad is run.

This would level the "playing field" and remove the inherent advantage held by incumbents. This law would apply to any candidate for any office in the state of Michigan. This law would also prevent special interest groups from buying the government which is by, for, and of the people. This law would allow good politicians to serve indefinitely. It would keep experienced lawmakers in office as long as they perform well. This law would also make the act of candidates accepting donations from organizations not represented in the state of Michigan illegal.

Anyone interested in helping to promote such an initiative should contact me. Anyone with ideas to make the initiative better should also contact me. It's up to us, the voters, to do the really tough jobs. Our lawmakers would like to end term limits. Perhaps we should end them in favor of a better idea. Leveling the playing field and making campaigns easier for challengers would end the shortcomings of term limits.

DAVID RYAN

Alger

Turned down

To the editor:

I find it so hard to believe that the Midland Daily News is giving so much coverage to the "possible" cuts at Bullock Creek. The "Creek" has been in the paper more in the last month than the whole 2007-2008 school year.

As a teacher at the Creek, it is very frustrating that this year alone, I have contacted the news to come out and cover "great" things that were happening. Both times I called, I was turned down. So now I see all the coverage we are getting and this could hurt the district, but when something positive could have been reported it did not fit into the reporter's schedule. I guess the MDN would rather report on things that can hurt education rather than things that are really happening in education.

JULIE RINN

Sanford

Roundabout not needed

To the editor:

A roundabout for the busiest intersection in Midland! Yikes! Surely MDOT is kidding. This type of "change" would cause a nightmare. Obviously, the traffic survey was taken sometime late Sunday, perhaps around 3 a.m. Not having taken a vehicle count myself, I can only guess how many vehicles actually travel through the intersection in a 24-hour time frame. I shudder to think about the outcome during a funeral procession or an emergency vehicle needing the right of way.

I would like to remind the citizens of Midland as well as the City Engineering Department that we tried this concept (only on a smaller scale) at the Circle; vehicles going around the Circle versus through the center didn't work there either, as evidenced by the current layout. As I recall, the plan presented a few years ago to put in a roundabout by the Mall was not acceptable to the citizens of Midland.

Our two "sister" cities, Bay City and Saginaw, both with a larger number of vehicles traveling through their busiest intersections daily i.e., Wheeler and Euclid and Bay and Tittabawasee, haven't found a need for a roundabout. Midland doesn't need a roundabout either. Instead, let's strive for a better flow of traffic utilizing other methods.

A good place to start would be with the elimination of the exit next to the Burger King on Eastman Road. Allowing traffic to enter the mall area there doesn't seem to cause congestion, however, exiting at that point should be eliminated all together. Many drivers ignore the traffic signal and tie up traffic both ways there. Am I the only one that observes this happening daily?

Referring to Dick McCreadie's letter, I believe he has a valid point regarding how state funds are misappropriated by spending good money on bad ideas just because the funds are available. And yes, our city engineers and MDOT personnel should be ashamed. I'm sure using these funds on a good traffic study along the entire routes of Eastman and Saginaw Roads - not just the intersection - would be more appropriate.